


so this must be the place

by animalSaint, FreezingKaiju



Category: Neon Genesis Evangelion
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Moving In Together, POV Alternating, Sharing a Room, Understanding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:42:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27751738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/animalSaint/pseuds/animalSaint, https://archiveofourown.org/users/FreezingKaiju/pseuds/FreezingKaiju
Summary: a storm brews over tokyo-3.a doll sits alone, gathering dust, pondering a life of her own.a fire enters, flickering away, seeking any way to not burn out.the fire needs a place to smolder, and the doll welcomes the warmth.
Relationships: Ayanami Rei/Souryuu Asuka Langley
Comments: 8
Kudos: 46





	so this must be the place

A thunderstorm. Rolling across the horizon, truly roiling as so many describe. Its bolts are already striking down, in the distance, and it has yet to reach Tokyo-3. 

The Romantic heroes of certain books, and indeed many of the authors, would take this time to recline in a comfortable chair. With company, perhaps, or a book, or a case, or pen in hand to continue their manuscript. They would smile, turn on a lamp, and be content in the fact that their lives are what they make of it. 

Rei Ayanami has no such comforts. 

What she has are few and far between. A fridge, a stockpile of instant ramen, water heaters (Units 1-3, a rare decision resembling some human form of creativity), two new novels and seven she has read time and time again, unknown obligation, an all-too-known fate, and despair, rage, and sorrow all brewing under a seal that cannot, no matter what, be loosened. 

Yet now, faced with a day of nothing ahead, Rei does not find herself yearning for the Commander’s Scenario, for her inevitable end. She yearns for warmth, yes, for some comfort, but... this feels almost like something to be enjoyed. Something that makes her wish for an outlet, even for something as simple as this contentment. An island reached, in a vile, miserable sea. 

The air is electric. Something will happen. So she sits on her bed, and waits.

_ What a shithole. _

This should be the building. It should be, the address scribbled on the crumpled note in Asuka's fist says so, but it's hard to believe the commander would leave his precious little pet in a building that looks like it should be condemned. 

Asuka grits her teeth and growls. Who gives a fuck where Wonder Girl lives?! Certainly not Asuka. 

And maybe not Wonder Girl either. 

She stomps up the stairs, her heavy footsteps charged with an anger that reverberates through the building, echoes off the near-derelict walls and right back into Asuka's heart. She isn't here by choice-- well, she is, but only because it's the only place she can go. She won't go back to that damn apartment. She  _ can't _ . She can't go to Hikari's, not after she fucked up again, not after Suzuhara-- 

Asuka shakes off the thought, biting back the bile rising in her throat. There's nothing for her in those memories, not now; she'll wait for the loneliest hours of night to let them tear her apart. Instead, her strong gait falters, her feet drag against the floor. So many of the rooms flanking her are numberless, adding to the repetition, that dusty staleness that pervades the air in sight and smell.  _ Oh, I get it. This really is the perfect place to leave Ayanami, _ Asuka thinks, scoffing quietly. 

She eventually comes to a stop in front of a door that... actually still has a number on it. Coincidentally the same number she's looking for. Asuka takes a deep breath, her shoulders tense and shaking, her jaw clenched, her fists curled into balls-- and she knocks on the door, loud and clear.

A knock at the door. Someone has need of the First Child. 

The agents from section two know to enter whenever. Her door is unlocked; she does not possess the key. The only one she would want to keep out is the one with the sole copy. 

Rei marks her page with a loose bandage, one that won't stain but serves its purpose well enough. She gets up from her bed, opens her fridge, and shoves her books inside alongside the leftovers; it will do as a hiding place, for now. They will not respond well to her choices of information, or atleast Rei believes as such. 

She returns to position, back rigid, face blank as ever, and forces what little expression is there back into nonexistence. 

Her footsteps ghost down the hall. 

She hesitates before the door, looks away, places her hand on the knob (sealing her own complacency, playing her own sad role in this twisted mock-politeness) then opens it with, "the First Child, reporting for duty.”

Asuka just stands there for a moment, silent, just staring at the girl before her as seething anger boils in her stomach. Oh, well, shouldn't Asuka should feel honored-- Rei Ayanami has bothered to open the fucking door. Asuka maintains eye contact with her, meets those pools of deep red framed by gentle locks of blueness with a  _ glare _ like somehow that will make Ayanami just stop being as disgustingly and effortlessly pretty as she always is.  _ Just like a fucking doll. _

Asuka feels sick to her stomach. 

Before she can think twice about it, Asuka shoulders her way past Rei and into the apartment. She stops in the middle of the room, taking in the sight-- Misato's apartment is  _ filthy _ , but at least that mess is a sign of  _ living _ , even if it is terrible living. This... it may not be a pigsty, but it's definitely not better. Bare walls, laundry everywhere, tiny minifridge,  _ blood stains on the sheets _ ... 

This isn't an apartment. This is a graveyard. 

Her voice returns to her, and she forces a mocking bite into her next words, still trembling with emotions she doesn't want to sort out. Here is definitive proof that Asuka is better than Rei, that she is an actual human being. So why does her chest feel hollow? "...Gottverdammt, Wonder Girl, you live like this?”

Rei Ayanami stumbles back, eyes wide for a solitary moment. 

NERV has not come for her, nor has the Commander. The Second Child has come  _ to _ her, for some unknown purpose, alive with fire and anger and energy, alongside further emotions Rei doubts her own capabilities to recognize. 

Her presence is a blaze Rei was unprepared for, and some part of her is terrified. Another is enraged, less the rage of a human being whose home has been entered (after all, Rei let her in) but more that of a ghost whose mausoleum has been opened. 

“I would not call it ‘living’,” Rei responds after significant pause. She cannot match the Second Child’s volume, so she does not attempt to; rather, she closes her door, walks down the hall, and tries somehow to make her footsteps sound  _ present _ . The attempt is a failure. Rei feels like a memory in her own residence. “I exist here. More than that is unnecessary.”

Asuka, for once, remains silent. Her shoulders remain taut as she gauges Ayanami's response. This is her home? This is where the precious doll is kept? 

_ This has to be a joke. _

It has to be. It's all one huge  _ joke _ , just like her relocation to NERV Japan, just like Misato's promotion, just like Kaji's rejection, her sync rates, her mother's love. Everything's just a fucking joke, and Asuka is the only one not laughing. 

Stretches of silence, marked only by a quiet sniffle. Asuka feels her throat burning, filled with words that beg and plead to escape into the noiseless air. Her ribcage feels like if she doesn't speak it might all but split open, leaving her heart exposed to the world. And God knows Asuka can't let that happen. 

"I couldn't stay there anymore." Asuka's voice comes out thick and strained. She clenches her fists until they're shaking as much as her words. "They make me  _ sick. _ ”

She could not  _ stay _ there. What could that imply? That the Second Child plans to stay  _ here _ ? On Rei's bloodstained mattress, with her paltry food, her lack of heat, her nothingness... Rei cannot help but stare at her. A rare feeling, indeed, usually her colleague burns too bright to be witnessed, or some other reason comes to mind to not look. 

But now, here, she cannot look away. 

She cannot ignore the Second Child, the girl, the real person before her. 

"If...I am permitted to speak. I...do not know a reason to hate Major Katsuragi, but I do not know her. The Third Child..." Rei trails off, her opinions likely unwanted, but perhaps they could offer commiseration to the Second Child's emotions. And perhaps she could finally tell someone what goes on inside her. "...he is sickening.”

Asuka studies the bed for a moment, the sheets flecked with bloodstains both new and old-- when was the last time Ayanami cleaned those?-- then she sits down on the floor in front of it, slumping against the bedframe. 

Ayanami's words burn against Asuka's ears and tear into her chest; Asuka knows Shinji is not a kind, selfless child come to play savior of the world-- he's a sniveling coward at best, and... Asuka doesn't want to see him at his worst. She just didn't expect Ayanami to  _ agree _ with her. 

Asuka scoffs halfheartedly, her venom spent for now. "Wonder Girl, having an  _ opinion _ ? Ha, the world must be ending or something." There's no sharpness in her words, no matter how much she tries. She just hugs her knees, staring at the floor next to her like it might show her how everything in her life went wrong. 

She looks up at Rei eventually, eyes narrowed. "...How would you know, anyway? Don't you like him or something?" Though speaking of Shinji with contempt is nothing new, Asuka's words are tainted with a strange bitterness that she can't hide.

Rei's face visibly sours (it's slight, but sour), and she blinks. She...gave off that impression?  _ How? When? _ At what point in their interactions has she ever seemed to favor the child of Commander Ikari? At what point has she seemed to favor anyone? Her mind reels, and casts a line. 

She continues to stand, gazes down at the Second Child, at how odd the oft-blue light of her apartment tints the girl in red. It feels wrong. She does not belong. Yet it compliments her eyes.

"I...envied him. For his distance from the Commander, from his childhood apart. For having a childhood. And other things he.... did to me, things he said, that may...run in his family. But..." She looks away from Second, towards her pile of bandages. Red to red, pain to pain. At least one is alive. "I have attempted to understand him. He did not return the gesture. That is the core of it. What exactly gave you the impression I... _ liked _ him?" Her words are tinged with fear, subtly for most, for her a practical cry.

Asuka's eyes widen a fraction as she watches Ayanami's face contort ever so slightly at what Asuka realizes now must've been taken as one hell of an insult. Asuka marvels at the rare display for a moment before she tears her eyes away, brow furrowing in contemplation.  _ She... doesn't? Not at all? _ What did Asuka expect? Maybe she thought if Ayanami hated Shinji, that loathing would be as loud and vocal and  _ explosive _ as Asuka's. Of course it wouldn't be. This girl is a fucking mystery. 

"I don't know. I just..." She trails off and bites her lip. She has to pick her words carefully. "I thought you wanted to be friends with him."  _ More than you wanted to be friends with me, anyway. _ "Or... something else. Things just always seem to work out like that." 

The bitterness, palpable on her tongue, sits like a burning coal in her stomach with a pestering agony. Just more competition, more sensation, more lies she formed out of nothing, more reasons to hate Shinji-- She buries her face in her knees. "Just forget it. It's stupid.”

Rei knows, knows,  _ knows _ the Second Child is experiencing distress. She is entirely bereft of responses to this. No one has ever reassured her, so she has no model to base from, aside from one novel's familial example. And Rei is afraid, for the first time, that if she touches the Second Child she may shatter, aside from the other way around. 

Familial. That is...something she can speak about. She can keep talking, and perhaps that will help.  _ Perhaps my presence will mean something. _ Rei opens her mouth and begins to speak anew. 

"In some twisted sense, he and I are relatives. I assumed that would mean...some sense of family. So at first, yes. By the time you arrived, I had already learned otherwise." She trails off, stares at the wall, observes the way the grey sky turns the brown to an almost calming shade of blue. "I lost hope... a few days before you arrived. I do not recall how many.”

_ Family. _ Asuka's stomach twists. Family has never meant anything good to Asuka-- her step-mom, who gave up on trying to be her mother; her father, a pathetic, wishy-washy coward with no fucking conscience; her mother-- no, she refuses to linger on that one. She can't really understand Rei's thought process.  _ She's just weird. Shrug it off. _

But on some awful level, she  _ does _ .

Asuka props her chin on her knees, still studiously examining the floor. "God, I wish I figured it out earlier." She glances up for half a second. "The whole... 'Shinji being an asshole' thing, I mean." If only she did. Maybe she wouldn't have tried to kiss him. She could swear she still has a bad taste in her mouth. It's  _ disgusting. _

Her grip on her knees tightens, her face twist into a look of revolt. "I can't stand living in the same apartment as him. I just  _ can't _ . And I don't fucking want to." She looks back up at Rei, and her face softens into something pathetic. "That's why I'm here, I guess," she says, voice small.

Rei blinks, processes this, glances towards the Second Child's face and finds she cannot look away. She has never seen her like this...never met whatever facet of her soul is being bared at the moment for Rei to bear witness to and wonder  _ why, why, why has she chosen me? _

_ She keeps choosing me, _ some dark part of her mind whispers,  _ and I push her away. Am I cruel, for that? Am I proving my own inhumanity? This is my third chance. Many things come in threes. This may be the final hope I am allowed. _

"...I have...an extra mattress. In the closet," Rei begins, words tentative, slow, an uncaring list at first. "A change of sheets. A functional stove. I have my water heaters, my books, my refrigerator, my desk...very few things to offer. This is not a home to me...but it can be yours.”

Asuka looks up in shock. Her anger has weakened considerably, but a heat lingers in her chest, gentle but overwhelming.  _ Did... did she really just...? _

Asuka didn't even ask-- she didn't even consider the possibility of sharing an apartment with Ayanami, not now and not ever. Earlier she would have laughed at the idea, maybe even mock it-- but something about Rei's eyes makes it... feel more like something Asuka needs. How did Rei know that? 

"I-- Uh--" Asuka stutters. Here she is, finally away from Shinji, away from the world that hates her-- and Ayanami has offered to keep it that way, if only for a short time. Who would've thought Wonder Girl could be... actually  _ kind _ ? 

"I-- I would, but-- are you sure?!"  _ Are you willing to put up with me? Are you sure you want that? _

The silence would be deafening, were it not for the distant crackles of thunder. It is her responsibility to break it (break the silence is such a violent term, but Rei supposes it is appropriate, for it hardens here like bakelite between them). She is thoroughly aware. But... 

“I am not sure.” 

Rei Ayanami is sure of precious few things: she is replaceable, the Scenario will come to pass, and the written word is her only possible salvation. The first two are assurances from the Commander, the last a desperation she clings to; if she loses sight of its surity she will lose the final staple holding her insides shut.

Yet this, ambiguous as it is, is a decision that could have some meaning. Perhaps not in the grand scheme of things, but...a decision of hers could  _ mean something _ . To someone. A decision of her own, beginning to end. 

To open her heart. 

She removes her arms from their positions at her sides, places her hands in her lap, and breathes. “I am unsure, but...I have chosen.” Rei turns her head, and extends a hand to the Second Child. Stiff, mechanical, but somehow real. “You can live here, as long as you like.”

Asuka feels something like her heart exploding, but weirdly enough she doesn't hate it. This offer... it sinks into her chest and brings in a warmth that fills her whole body and faintly colors her cheeks. It's the first time in a while that Asuka feels anywhere near okay, here with this kindness nestled where her heart should be. 

When was the last time someone was truly kind to her? 

She takes Rei's hand gingerly in her own, more warmth shooting up her arm, shooting a modicum of guilt into her gut. Another little thing to ignore, store away until it festers and infects her in the night. But not now. She needs to give Ayanami her answer before she can think of what must be her tragic downfall. Asuka swallows thickly, looking Rei in the eye. "I... I'm staying here." Asuka's voice is firm, more firm than it has been in a while. The words stand in the air, knowing their role and importance in the universe. It isn't a decision, it's a promise.

With that confirmation, Rei cannot look away. She holds the Second Child's hand in turn, loosely, yet not limp, not letting go. The electricity in the air is literal, in a sense; the lightning is growing close, the thunder rumbles over Tokyo-3, and Rei can hear the rain impact the building's side. It's a wonder that her roof has yet to leak; perhaps the apartment has decided, now that it possesses a worthwhile inhabitant, it can become a sanctuary once more. 

Second's things. They will need to--  _ Rei _ will need to acquire them from Major Katsuragi, from Shinji. She will not put her new (guest? roommate? friend, perhaps? Rei is unsure) through the ordeal of meeting him again. 

And there are likely other amenities she requires...ones she has yet to consider, yet to observe in a proper home. 

But that is all in due time. For now, it is Rei Ayanami, Asuka Langley Soryu,  _ their _ apartment, and whatever the night may present. 

"Welcome home.”


End file.
